Her slaughter
by SILENTSANCTUARY
Summary: Killing a human being isn't hard, one slit of a throat and they are gone. Or is it? SASUKE, OROCHIMARU, KABUTO, SAKURA


[This is my first fanfiction written for the Naruto series, as well as my first fanfiction about Sasuke. I know that some of you hate his character, but he happens to be one of my favorite characters in Naruto.]

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By the time he is fifteen, two years after he had deserted Konoha, Sasuke is able to kill several men with one flick of his sword. He didn't even have to take both of his swords out of their sheaths to accomplish this. With his Sharingan, killing was made easy – almost effortless. He saw through his enemies' moves as if they were only playing a slow sword dance with him. Sometimes Orochimaru would call this "cheating" and tell him to kill without the use of his Sharingan, but either way, the lack of difficulty didn't change.

The first time he fell fifty men, he stood over their bodies like some kind of conqueror, eyes showing no empathy, black as shadows. He had killed them in such a way that they spilled little blood. One quick slit on the throat or one pinch of the main arteries was enough to kill them.

If he was lucky, Orochimaru would challenge him instead of the countless men Kabuto kidnapped for Sasuke's target practice. Sometimes there would be an ANBU ninja to entertain him for a while, but kidnapping one was extremely risky considering they could escape and tell others of their whereabouts.

He would kill scores of men -- armies of them until he was sure that his heart couldn't be as black and his sins couldn't be as deep. Everyday was the same routine. Wake up. Eat. Then training with a new group of kidnapped men. Occasionally, Orochimaru taught him a forbidden jutsu – but only when he thought that Sasuke was getting bored from the tireless schedule.

One day, they bought in a girl. It was a sudden change to all the sweat-streaked men who yelled and screamed at him before they were killed. At first, he was puzzled at her reason being here. There were no armies of men armed with special attacks, weapons or abilities. Just the girl, standing by herself in the empty field.

"Go ahead," Orochimaru said dismissively. "Kill her."

Sasuke took his sword out as usual. In his mind, he was already playing out the possible actions she would partake once he had made his first move. When he took a step forward and his eyes gave a good look at his enemy standing right in front of him, he balked, taking a step back. It was certainly the first time he had ever done this and he was rather annoyed at himself.

After a few seconds, he erased his mind of distractions and poised his sword near her throat. He will kill her just like all the other men he had killed – all the people he had betrayed. What would one more do to make a difference? He paused again, waiting for her to yell or attack. That's what all the men would do once his sword was an inch away from slicing through them.

Several _more_ seconds passed and he was beginning to get frustrated at how she was doing nothing to move. She just stared at him passively with green eyes, eyes that he hadn't seen in two years – two years since he had left that accursed village, vowing never to return. Her hair wasn't pink as he almost expected it to be, but it was close to it. It was a light maroon color, the dusty color of dying roses. He smiled despite himself. There was no girl that would have the same color hair as Sakura did. Sakura's hair was the color of candyfloss, a subtle shade of roses. This girl wasn't Sakura. So why was he hesitating to kill her?

"Why aren't you fighting back?"

The girl blinked, green eyes looking at somewhere far off in the distance. When she finally responded, her voice was simple and concise as if she was just talking about something as ordinary as the weather.

"You killed my father, my brother and my husband to be. Why fight when everyone I love is dead?"

Sasuke paused, thinking of the correct answer. He knew what it was like to lose your family, to have your entire clan wiped out by the very person you thought you trusted the most. He had many answers for the question the girl was seeking, but he would waste time trying to tell his story. His was running out of patience for her.

"You're right," he said, his sword tracing small circles in the air before bringing it down on her neck. Ringlets of blood splashed onto his face as she dropped to the floor, dead and dumb to the world.

He walked away not bothering to take a second look. He slipped the sword back into his sheath without cleaning it of the blood stained on its surface. Without a word, he elbowed Kabuto aside and strode past Orochimaru. Training was over for him today. He was already planning to go back into his room and study a couple of jutsu scrolls just so that he could get his mind off what happened today.

But before he walked clear of their hearing distance, he stopped and asked out loud, voice on the verge of cracking from its cold shell.

"Why did you bring her? Are you trying to make fun of me Kabuto?"

Kabuto shook his head. "I didn't bring her – I – "

"I did," Orochimaru interrupted, voice as smooth as silk. "You can't forget them can you? Your foolish friends back in that stupid village. You're not ready for that forbidden technique I was planning to teach you."

Sasuke remained silent although his silence had a touch of hidden fury to it. Orochimaru continued speaking, unaware that he was pushing his apprentice to a breaking point.

"Power is about throwing away any distractions and directing all your attention into strengthening it. It is a fire that needs to be quenched in order for it to grow. Or how else are you going to kill your brother?"

The question lingered long after Sasuke departed from the training field but it remained unanswered like so many others.

The next day, similar looking girls lined up on the field, placid and unmoving as the girl yesterday. And the same process repeated itself.

Like the countless individuals whose lives he claimed by his hand, he killed them all.

But the one thing he could not kill was his image of her, the very thought of the pink hair she had once sacrificed for him, those green eyes all of the girls had in common. He swore that every time he stabbed his sword through all those girls lining up on the training field, it was like killing her image little by little until he couldn't think of her without thinking of blood, wide-open eyes and lips black with death.


End file.
